Police report having to take patients to hospitals amid crisis
Injured people are having to be taken to hospital by police officers because of the crisis faced by the ambulance service, according to the Scottish Police Federation.
The trade union said it knows of approximately 30 cases in recent months where patients were driven to hospital in police cars because of a lack of available ambulances or long waits for paramedics.
Last month the army was called in to help drive ambulances amid deteriorating response times and warnings about driver shortages from the ambulance service.
Butnowthepolicefederation has revealed officers are being also asked to attend medical emergencies and have helped by taking patients to hospital in the absence of ambulances.
The Scottish Ambulance Service has denied the claims.
Examples recorded by Police Scotland officers - as reported
by the 1919 Magazine - included an unconscious man who had attempted to take his own life by overdose being driven to hospital in a police car because no ambulance had attended more than an hour after being called.
Another incident involved an elderly man lying on a pavement with a leg injury and in "extreme confusion", according to the police report, with his foot turning black.
More than five and a half hours after a 999 call was made, and with all ambulances unavailable, he was put in the back of an "extremely uncomfortable" police van and taken to hospital.
A third case was the ambulance service reportedly calling for the police to help with a woman whose motorbike had fallen on her, leaving her with an open compound fracture of her lower leg.
Gordon Forsyth from the Scottish Police Federation said: "I've got a list of 30-odd examples, various things where the police have been sent to calls because an ambulance hasn't been available, or having to wait for a significant period of time for an ambulance to get there.”
A spokeswoman for the Scottish Ambulance Service said: "We do not ask Police officers to attend emergency situations instead of an ambulance crew or transport patients to hospital.."
Scottish Conservative health spokesman Dr Sandesh Gulhane said: "It highlights a service at breaking point.”